The director's take

Television film director Mel Morpeth has worked on several Time Team programmes before, but this was something a bit different. This is what he had to say about the experience:

Have you ever filmed underwater before?
Yes I have. About five years ago I worked on a wreck in the South Pacific, which was very interesting.

It's often hectic enough filming Time Team, how do you even approach making a programme underwater?
The basic premise is that everything takes at least twice as long to do. On an ordinary Time Team you have three camera crews running around shooting everything, but with marine archaeology everything has to be a lot more controlled. It was good working with the ADU (Archaeological Diving Unit) because they had a strict schedule of work to be done each day. That gave us a framework to work around and impose our filming schedule on.

What was it like working with the RAF divers?
They were brilliant. Working with the armed services you tend to get things done really quickly. Every morning they had a briefing of the tasks for the day and by lunch time they had done them all! They work really efficiently with a proper command structure and great competence.

Were the conditions difficult for you as a director?
We were lucky really as it was filmed in July last year, but by the end we did start to get the storm warnings. It turned out to be a westerly gale, which is the one that blows you back onto the rocks and cliffs – just the wrong sort of weather. In fact it was just the sort of weather that probably caused the ship to come to grief all those years ago.

How about safety?
Safety was everything. To get Phil, Tony and Katie into the water required at least another three people with them just to check everything was running along safely.

Equipment and logistics wise, how did you manage?
The whole project was an exercise in logistics. I couldn't get down to the wreck myself, so I directed the shoot from onboard ship. We had pre-dive chats about what we wanted and then we had an underwater camera operator together with some helmet mounted cameras and the ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) which also held a camera – a bit like the 'trench-cams' we used on the Live last year. It was fairly flexible for filming. Some of the divers were also working with umbilical lines so that we could communicate with them from the surface.

Would you like to do it again?
It would be great to go back to the wreck if we could excavate further. Underwater filming is expensive because of the problems involved, plus the extra professionals required and the need to charter ships for the duration, but I certainly enjoyed doing the programme and would love to do it again.